TERRA SANTA

[169] THE enthusiasm that had glowed, or seemed to glow, within me for one blessed moment when I knelt by the shrine of
the Virgin at Nazareth, was not rekindled at Jerusalem. In the stead of the solemn gloom and the deep
stillness that of right belonged to the Holy City, there was the hum and the bustle of active life. It was the
"height of the season." The Easter ceremonies drew near. The pilgrims were flocking in from all quarters; and
although their objects were partly at least of a religious character, yet their "arrivals" brought as much
stir and liveliness to the city as if they had come up to marry their daughters.

The votaries who every year crowd to the Holy Sepulchre are chiefly of the Greek and Armenian Churches. They
are not drawn into Palestine by a mere sentimental longing to stand upon the ground trodden by our Saviour,
but rather they perform the pilgrimage as a plain duty strongly inculcated by their religion. A very great
proportion of those who belong to the Greek Church contrive at some time or other in the course of their lives
to achieve the enterprise.
[170] Many in their infancy and childhood are brought to the holy sites by their parents, but those who have not had
this advantage will often make it the main object of their lives to save money enough for this holy
undertaking.

The pilgrims begin to arrive in Palestine some weeks before the Easter festival of the Greek Church. They come
from Egypt, from all parts of Syria, from Armenia and Asia Minor, from Stamboul, from Roumelia, from the
provinces of the Danube, and from all the Russias. Most of these people bring with them some articles of
merchandise, but I myself believe (notwithstanding the common taunt against pilgrims) that they do this rather
as a mode of paying the expenses of their journey, than from a spirit of mercenary speculation. They generally
travel in families, for the women are of course more ardent than their husbands in undertaking these pious
enterprises, and they take care to bring with them all their children, however young; for the efficacy of the
rites does not depend upon the age of the votary, so that people whose careful mothers have obtained for them
the benefit of the pilgrimage in early life, are saved from the expense and trouble of undertaking the journey
at a later age.

The superior veneration so often excited by objects that are distant and unknown shows not perhaps the
wrongheadedness of a man, but rather the transcendent power of his imagination. However this may be, and
whether it is by mere obstinacy that they poke their way through intervening distance, or whether they come by
the winged strength of fancy, quite certainly the pilgrims who flock to Palestine from the most remote homes
are the people most eager in the enterprise, and in number too they bear a very high proportion to the whole
mass.

ORANGEMARKETAT JAFFA.

The great bulk of the pilgrims make their way by sea to the port of Jaffa. A number of families will charter a
vessel amongst them, all bringing their own provisions, which are of the simplest and cheapest kind. On board
every vessel thus freighted there is, I believe, a priest, who helps the people in their religious exercises,
and tries (and fails) to maintain
[173] something like order and harmony. The vessels employed in this service are usually Greek brigs or brigantines
and schooners, and the number of passengers stowed in them is almost always horribly excessive. The voyages
are sadly protracted, not only by the land-seeking, storm-flying habits of the Greek seamen, but also by their
endless schemes and speculations, which are for ever tempting them to touch at the nearest port. The voyage
too must be made in winter, in order that Jerusalem may be reached some weeks before the Greek Easter.

When the pilgrims have landed at Jaffa they hire camels, horses, mules, or donkeys, and make their way as well
as they can to the Holy City. The space fronting the Church of the Holy Sepulchre soon becomes a kind of
bazaar, or rather, perhaps, reminds you of an English fair. On this spot the pilgrims display their
merchandise, and there too the trading residents of the place offer their goods for sale. I have never, I
think, seen elsewhere in Asia so much commercial animation as upon this square of ground by the church door;
the "money-changers" seemed to be almost as brisk and lively as if they had been within the
temple.

When I entered the church I found a babel of worshippers. Greek, Roman, and Armenian priests were performing
their different rites in various nooks and corners, and crowds of disciples were rushing about in all
directions, some laughing and talking, some begging, but most of them going round in a regular and methodical
way to kiss the sanctified spots, and speak the appointed syllables, and lay down the accustomed coin. If this
kissing of the shrines had seemed as though it were done at the bidding of enthusiasm, or of any poor
sentiment even feebly approaching to it, the sight would have been less odd to English eyes; but as it was, I
stared to see grown men thus steadily and carefully embracing the sticks and the stones, not from love or from
zeal (else God forbid that I should have stared!), but from a calm sense of duty; they seemed to be not
"working out," but transacting the great business of salvation.

[174] Dthemetri, however, who generally came with me when I went out, in order to do duty as interpreter, really had
in him some enthusiasm. He was a zealous and almost fanatical member of the Greek Church, and had long since
performed the pilgrimage, so now great indeed was the pride and delight with which he guided me from one holy
spot to another. Every now and then, when he came to an unoccupied shrine, he fell down on his knees and
performed devotion; he was almost distracted by the temptations that surrounded him; there were so many stones
absolutely requiring to be kissed, that he rushed about happily puzzled and sweetly teased, like "Jack among
the maidens."

A Protestant, familiar with the Holy Scriptures, but ignorant of tradition and the geography of modern
Jerusalem, finds himself a good deal "mazed" when he first looks for the sacred sites. The Holy Sepulchre is
not in a field without the walls, but in the midst, and in the best part of the town, under the roof of the
great church which I have been talking about. It is a handsome tomb of oblong form, partly subterranean and
partly above ground, and closed in on all sides except the one by which it is entered. You descend into the
interior by a few steps, and there find an altar with burning tapers. This is the spot which is held in
greater sanctity than any other at Jerusalem. When you have seen enough of it you feel perhaps weary of the
busy crowd, and inclined for a gallop; you ask your dragoman whether there will be time before sunset to
procure horses and take a ride to Mount Calvary. Mount Calvary, signor?—eccolo! it is
upstairs—on the first floor. In effect you ascend, if I remember rightly, just thirteen steps,
and then you are shown the now golden sockets in which the crosses of our Lord and the two thieves were fixed.
All this is startling, but the truth is, that the city having gathered round the Sepulchre, which is the main
point of interest, has crept northward, and thus in great measure are occasioned the many geographical
surprises that puzzle the "Bible Christian."

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre comprises very
com- [175] pendiously almost all the spots associated with the closing career of our Lord. Just there, on your right, He
stood and wept; by the pillar, on your left, He was scourged; on the spot, just before you, He was crowned
with the crown of thorns; up there He was crucified, and down here He was buried. A locality is assigned to
every, the minutest, event connected with the recorded history of our Saviour; even the spot where the cock
crew when Peter denied his Master is ascertained, and surrounded by the walls of an Armenian convent. Many
Protestants are wont to treat these traditions contemptuously, and those who distinguish themselves from their
brethren by the appellation of "Bible Christians" are almost fierce in their denunciation of these supposed
errors.

It is admitted, I believe, by everybody that the formal sanctification of these spots was the act of the
Empress Helena, the mother of Constantine, but I think it is fair to suppose that she was guided by a careful
regard to the then prevailing traditions. Now the nature of the ground upon which Jerusalem stands is such,
that the localities belonging to the events there enacted might have been more easily, and permanently,
ascertained by tradition than those of any city that I know of. Jerusalem, whether ancient or modern, was
built upon and surrounded by sharp, salient rocks intersected by deep ravines. Up to the time of the siege
Mount Calvary of course must have been well enough known to the people of Jerusalem; the destruction of the
mere buildings could not have obliterated from any man's memory the names of those steep rocks and narrow
ravines in the midst of which the city had stood. It seems to me, therefore, highly probable that in fixing
the site of Calvary the Empress was rightly guided. Recollect, too, that the voice of tradition at Jerusalem
is quite unanimous, and that Romans, Greeks, Armenians, and Jews, all hating each other sincerely, concur in
assigning the same localities to the events told in the Gospel. I concede, however, that the attempt of the
Empress to ascertain the sites of the minor events cannot be safely relied upon. With
[176] respect, for instance, to the certainty of the spot where the cock crew, I am far from being convinced.

Supposing that the Empress acted arbitrarily in fixing the holy sites, it would seem that she followed the
Gospel of St. John, and that the geography sanctioned by her can be more easily reconciled with that history
than with the accounts of the other Evangelists.

The authority exercised by the Mussulman Government in relation to the holy sites is in one view somewhat
humbling to the Christians, for it is almost as an arbitrator between the contending sects (this always, of
course, for the sake of pecuniary advantage) that the Mussulman lends his contemptuous aid; he not only
grants, but enforces toleration. All persons, of whatever religion, are allowed to go as they will into every
part of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, but in order to prevent indecent contests, and also from motives
arising out of money payments, the Turkish Government assigns the peculiar care of each sacred spot to one of
the ecclesiastic bodies. Since this guardianship carries with it the receipt of the coins which the pilgrims
leave upon the shrines, it is strenuously fought for by all the rival Churches, and the artifices of intrigue
are busily exerted at Stamboul in order to procure the issue or revocation of the firmans by which the coveted
privilege is granted. In this strife the Greek Church has of late years signally triumphed, and the most
famous of the shrines are committed to the care of their priesthood. They possess the golden socket in which
stood the cross of our Lord whilst the Latins are obliged to content themselves with the apertures in which
were inserted the crosses of the two thieves. They are naturally discontented with that poor privilege, and
sorrowfully look back to the days of their former glory—the days when Napoleon was Emperor, and
Sebastiani ambassador at the Porte.

Although the pilgrims perform their devotions at the several shrines with so little apparent enthusiasm, they
are driven to the verge of madness by the miracle displayed before them on Easter Saturday. Then it is that
the
Heaven- [177] sent fire issues from the Holy Sepulchre. The pilgrims all assemble in the great church, and already, long
before the wonder is worked, they are wrought by anticipation of God's sign, as well as by their struggles for
room and breathing space, to a most frightful state of excitement. At length the chief priest of the Greeks,
accompanied (of all people in the world) by the Turkish Governor, enters the tomb. After this, there is a long
pause, and then suddenly from out of the small apertures on either side of the sepulchre there issue long,
shining flames. The pilgrims now rush forward, madly struggling to light their tapers at the holy fire. This
is the dangerous moment, and many lives are often lost.

The year before that of my going to Jerusalem, Ibrahim Pasha, from some whim, or motive of policy, chose to
witness the miracle. The vast church was of course thronged, as it always is on that awful day. It seems that
the appearance of the fire was delayed for a very long time, and that the growing frenzy of the people was
heightened by suspense. Many, too, had already sunk under the effect of the heat and the stifling atmosphere,
when at last the fire flashed from the sepulchre. Then a terrible struggle ensued; many sunk and were crushed.
Ibrahim had taken his station in one of the galleries, but now, feeling perhaps his brave blood warmed by the
sight and sound of such strife, he took upon himself to quiet the people by his personal presence, and
descended into the body of the church with only a few guards. He had forced his way into the midst of the
dense crowd, when unhappily he fainted away; his guards shrieked out, and the event instantly became known. A
body of soldiers recklessly forced their way through the crowd, trampling over every obstacle that they might
save the life of their general. Nearly two hundred people were killed in the struggle.

The following year, however, the Government took better measures for the prevention of these calamities. I was
not present at the ceremony, having gone away from Jerusalem some time before, but I afterwards returned into
Palestine,
[178] and I then learned that the day had passed off without any disturbance of a fatal kind. It is, however,
almost too much to expect that so many ministers of peace can assemble without finding some occasion for
strife, and in that year a tribe of wild Bedouins became the subject of discord. These men, it seems, led an
Arab life in some of the desert tracts bordering on the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, but were not connected
with any of the great ruling tribes. Some whim or notion of policy had induced them to embrace Christianity;
but they were grossly ignorant of the rudiments of their adopted faith, and having no priest with them in
their desert, they had as little knowledge of religious ceremonies as of religion itself. They were not even
capable of conducting themselves in a place of worship with ordinary decorum, but would interrupt the service
with scandalous cries and warlike shouts. Such is the account the Latins give of them, but I have never heard
the other side of the question. These wild fellows, notwithstanding their entire ignorance of all religion,
are yet claimed by the Greeks, not only as proselytes who have embraced Christianity generally, but as
converts to the particular doctrines and practice of their Church. The people thus alleged to have concurred
in the great schism of the Eastern Empire are never, I believe, within the walls of a church, or even of any
building at all, except upon this occasion of Easter; and as they then never fail to find a row of some kind
going on by the side of the sepulchre, they fancy, it seems, that the ceremonies there enacted are funeral
games of a martial character, held in honour of a deceased chieftain, and that a Christian festival is a
peculiar kind of battle, fought between walls, and without cavalry. It does not appear, however, that these
men are guilty of any ferocious acts, or that they attempt to commit depredations. The charge against them is
merely that by their way of applauding the performance, by their horrible cries and frightful gestures, they
destroy the solemnity of divine service, and upon this ground the Franciscans obtained a firman for the
exclusion of such tumultuous
[179] worshippers. The Greeks, however, did not choose to lose the aid of their wild converts merely because they
were a little backward in their religious education, and they therefore persuaded them to defy the firman by
entering the city en masse and overawing their enemies. The Franciscans, as well as the
Government authorities, were obliged to give way, and the Arabs triumphantly marched into the church. The
festival, however, must have seemed to them rather flat, for although there may have been some "casualties" in
the way of eyes black and noses bloody, and women "missing," there was no return of "killed."

Formerly the Latin Catholics concurred in acknowledging (but not, I hope, in working) the annual miracle of
the heavenly fire, but they have for many years withdrawn their countenance from this exhibition, and they now
repudiate it as a trick of the Greek Church. Thus of course the violence of feeling with which the rival
Churches meet at the Holy Sepulchre on Easter Saturday is greatly increased, and a disturbance of some kind is
certain. In the year I speak of, though no lives were lost, there was, as it seems, a tough struggle in the
church. I was amused at hearing of a taunt that was thrown that day upon an English traveller. He had taken
his station in a convenient part of the church, and was no doubt displaying that peculiar air of serenity and
gratification with which an English gentleman usually looks on at a row, when one of the Franciscans came by,
all reeking from the fight, and was so disgusted at the coolness and placid contentment of the Englishman (who
was a guest at the convent), that he forgot his monkish humility as well as the duties of hospitality, and
plainly said, "You sleep under our roof, you eat our bread, you drink our wine, and then when Easter Saturday
comes you don't fight for us!"

Yet these rival Churches go on quietly enough till their blood is up. The terms on which they live remind one
of the peculiar relation subsisting at Cambridge between "town and gown."

These contests waged by the priests and friars certainly
[180] do not originate with the lay pilgrims, the great body of whom are, as I believe, quiet and inoffensive
people. It is true, however, that their pious enterprise is believed by them to operate as a counterpoise for
a multitude of sins, whether past or future, and perhaps they exert themselves in after life to restore the
balance of good and evil. The Turks have a maxim which, like most cynical apophthegms, carries with it the
buzzing trumpet of falsehood as well as the small, fine "sting of truth." "If your friend has made the
pilgrimage once, distrust him; if he has made the pilgrimage twice, cut him dead!" The caution is said to be
as applicable to the visitants of Jerusalem as to those of Mecca, but I cannot help believing that the
frailties of all the hadjis,
whether Christian or Mahometan, are greatly exaggerated. I certainly regarded the pilgrims to Palestine as a
well-disposed orderly body of people, not strongly enthusiastic, but desirous to comply with the ordinances of
their religion, and to attain the great end of salvation as quietly and economically as possible.

When the solemnities of Easter are concluded the pilgrims move off in a body to complete their good work by
visiting the sacred scenes in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, including the wilderness of John the Baptist,
Bethlehem, and above all, the Jordan, for to bathe in those sacred waters is one of the chief objects of the
expedition. All the pilgrims—men, women, and children—are submerged en chemise, and the
saturated linen is carefully wrapped up and preserved as a burial-dress that shall enure for salvation in the
realms of death.

I saw the burial of a pilgrim. He was a Greek, miserably poor, and very old; he had just crawled into the Holy
City, and had reached at once the goal of his pious journey and the end of his sufferings upon earth. There
was no coffin nor wrapper, and as I looked full upon the face of the dead I saw how deeply it was rutted with
the ruts of age and misery. The priest, strong and portly, fresh, fat, and alive with the life of the animal
kingdom—unpaid, or ill paid for his
work [181] —would scarcely deign to mutter out his forms, but hurried over the words with shocking haste.
Presently he called out impatiently, "Yalla! Goor!" (Come! look sharp!), and then the dead Greek was seized.
His limbs yielded inertly to the rude men that handled them, and down he went into his grave, so roughly
bundled in that his neck was twisted by the fall, so twisted, that if the sharp malady of life were still upon
him the old man would have shrieked and groaned, and the lines of his face would have quivered with pain. The
lines of his face were not moved, and the old man lay still and heedless—so well cured of that tedious
life-ache, that nothing could hurt him now. His clay was itself again—cool, firm, and tough. The
pilgrim had found great rest. I threw the accustomed handful of the holy soil upon his patient face, and then,
and in less than a minute, the earth closed coldly round him.

I did not say "alas!" (nobody ever does that I know of, though the word is so frequently written). I thought
the old man had got rather well out of the scrape of being alive, and poor.

The destruction of the mere buildings in such a place as Jerusalem would not involve the permanent dispersion
of the inhabitants, for the rocky neighbourhood in which the town is situate abounds in caves, which would
give an easy refuge to the people until they gained an opportunity of rebuilding their dwellings; therefore I
could not help looking upon the Jews of Jerusalem as being in some sort the representatives, if not the actual
descendants, of the rascals who crucified our Saviour. Supposing this to be the case, I felt that there would
be some interest in knowing how the events of the Gospel history were regarded by the Israelites of modern
Jerusalem. The result of my inquiry upon this subject was, so far as it went, entirely favourable to the truth
of Christianity. I understood thatThe performance of the miracles was not doubted by any of the Jews in the
place; all of them concurred in attributing the works of our Lord to the influence of magic, but
they were divided as to the species of
[182] enchantment from which the power proceeded. The great mass of the Jewish people believe, I fancy, that the
miracles had been wrought by aid of the powers of darkness, but many, and those the more enlightened, would
call Jesus "the good Magician." To Europeans repudiating the notion of all magic, good or bad, the opinion of
the Jews as to the agency by which the miracles were worked is a matter of no importance; but the circumstance
of their admitting that those miracles were in fact performed, is certainly curious, and perhaps not
quite immaterial.

If you stay in the Holy City long enough to fall into anything like regular habits of amusement and
occupation, and to become, in short, for the time "a man about town" at Jerusalem, you will necessarily lose
the enthusiasm which you may have felt when you trod the sacred soil for the first time, and it will then seem
almost strange to you to find yourself so entirely surrounded in all your daily pursuits by the designs and
sounds of religion. Your hotel is a monastery, your rooms are cells, the landlord is a stately abbot, and the
waiters are hooded monks. If you walk out of the town you find yourself on the Mount of Olives, or in the
Valley of Jehoshaphat, or on the Hill of Evil Counsel. If you mount your horse and extend your rambles you
will be guided to the wilderness of St. John, or the birthplace of our Saviour. Your club is the great Church
of the Holy Sepulchre, where everybody meets everybody every day. If you lounge through the town, your Bond
Street is the Via Dolorosa, and the object of your hopeless affections is some maid or matron all forlorn, and
sadly shrouded in her pilgrim's robe. If you would hear music, it must be the chanting of friars; if you look
at pictures, you see virgins with misforeshortened arms, or devils out of drawing, or angels tumbling up the
skies in impious perspective. If you would make any purchases, you must go again to the church doors, and when
you inquire for the manufactures of the place, you find that they consist of double-blessed beads and
sanctified shells. These last are the favourite tokens which the pilgrims carry off with them. The
[183] shell is graven, or rather scratched, on the white side with a rude drawing of the Blessed Virgin or of the
Crucifixion or some other scriptural subject. Having passed this stage it goes into the hands of a priest. By
him it is subjected to some process for rendering it efficacious against the schemes of our ghostly enemy. The
manufacture is then complete, and is deemed to be fit for use.

The village of Bethlehem lies prettily couched on the slope of a hill. The sanctuary is a subterranean grotto,
and is committed to the joint-guardianship of the Romans, Greeks, and Armenians, who vie with each other in
adorning it. Beneath an altar gorgeously decorated, and lit with everlasting fires, there stands the low slab
of stone which marks the holy site of the Nativity; and near to this is a hollow scooped out of the living
rock. Here the infant Jesus was laid. Near the spot of the Nativity is the rock against which the Blessed
Virgin was leaning when she presented her babe to the adoring shepherds.

Many of those Protestants who are accustomed to despise tradition consider that this sanctuary is altogether
unscriptural, that a grotto is not a stable, and that mangers are made of wood. It is perfectly true, however,
that the many grottos and caves which are found among the rocks of Judea were formerly used for the reception
of cattle. They are so used at this day. I have myself seen grottos appropriated to this purpose.

You know what a sad and sombre decorum it is that outwardly reigns through the lands oppressed by Moslem sway.
The Mahometans make beauty their prisoner, and enforce such a stern and gloomy morality, or at all events,
such a frightfully close semblance of it, that far and long the wearied traveller may go without catching one
glimpse of outward happiness. By a strange chance in these latter days it happened that, alone of all the
places in the land, this Bethlehem, the native village of our Lord, escaped the moral yoke of the Mussulmans,
and heard again, after ages of dull oppression, the cheering clatter of social freedom, and the
[184] voices of laughing girls. It was after an insurrection, which had been raised against the authority of Mehemet
Ali, that Bethlehem was freed from the hateful laws of Asiatic decorum. The Mussulmans of the village had
taken an active part in the movement, and when Ibrahim had quelled it, his wrath was still so hot, that he put
to death every one of the few Mahometans of Bethlehem who had not already fled. The effect produced upon the
Christian inhabitants by the sudden removal of this restraint was immense. The village smiled once more. It is
true that such sweet freedom could not long endure. Even if the population of the place should continue to be
entirely Christian, the sad decorum of the Mussulmans, or rather of the Asiatics, would sooner or later be
restored by the force of opinion and custom. But for a while the sunshine would last, and when I was at
Bethlehem, though long after the flight of the Mussulmans, the cloud of Moslem propriety had not yet come back
to cast its cold shadow upon life. When you reach that gladsome village, pray Heaven there still may be heard
there the voice of free, innocent girls. It will sound so dearly welcome!

To a Christian, and thoroughbred Englishman, not even the licentiousness which generally accompanies it can
compensate for the oppressiveness of that horrible outward decorum, which turns the cities and the palaces of
Asia into deserts and gaols. So, I say, when you see and hear them, those romping girls of Bethlehem will
gladden your very soul. Distant at first, and then nearer and nearer the timid flock will gather around you,
with their large burning eyes gravely fixed against yours, so that they see into your brain; and if you
imagine evil against them, they will know of your ill thought before it is yet well born, and will fly and be
gone in the moment. But presently, if you will only look virtuous enough to prevent alarm, and vicious enough
to avoid looking silly, the blithe maidens will draw nearer and nearer to you, and soon there will be one, the
bravest of the sisters, who will venture right up to your side and touch the hem of your coat, in playful
defiance of the danger, and then the rest will follow the daring of their
youth- [185] ful leader, and gather close round you, and hold a shrill controversy on the wondrous formation that you call
a hat, and the cunning of the hands that clothed you with cloth so fine; and then growing more profound in
their researches, they will pass from the study of your mere dress to a serious contemplation of your stately
height, and your nut-brown hair, and the ruddy glow of your English cheeks. And if they catch a glimpse of
your ungloved fingers, then again will they make the air ring with their sweet screams of wonder and
amazement, as they compare the fairness of your hand with their warmer tints, and even with the hues of your
own sunburnt face. Instantly the ringleader of the gentle rioters imagines a new sin; with tremulous boldness
she touches, then grasps your hand, and smoothes it gently betwixt her own, and pries curiously into its make
and colour, as though it were silk of Damascus, or shawl of Cashmere. And when they see you even then still
sage and gentle, the joyous girls will suddenly and screamingly, and all at once, explain to each other that
you are surely quite harmless and innocent, a lion that makes no spring, a bear that never hugs, and upon this
faith, one after the other, they will take your passive hand, and strive to explain it, and make it a theme
and a controversy. But the one, the fairest and the sweetest of all, is yet the most timid; she shrinks from
the daring deeds of her play-mates, and seeks shelter behind their sleeves, and strives to screen her glowing
consciousness from the eyes that look upon her. But her laughing sisters will have none of this cowardice;
they vow that the fair one shall be their 'complice, shall share their dangers,
shall touch the hand of the stranger; they seize her small wrist, and drag her forward by force,
and at last, whilst yet she strives to turn away, and to cover up her whole soul under the folds of downcast
eyelids, they vanquish her utmost strength, they vanquish your utmost modesty, and marry her hand to yours.
The quick pulse springs from her fingers, and throbs like a whisper upon your listening palm. For an instant
her large timid eyes are upon you; in an instant they are shrouded again, and there comes a blush so burning
that
[186] the frightened girls stay their shrill laughter, as though they had played too perilously and harmed their
gentle sister. A moment, and all with a sudden intelligence turn away and fly like deer, yet soon again like
deer they wheel round and return, and stand, and gaze upon the danger, until they grow brave once more.

"I regret to observe, that the removal of the moral restraint imposed by the presence of the Mahometan
inhabitants has led to a certain degree of boisterous, though innocent, levity in the bearing of the
Christians, and more especially in the demeanour of those who belong to the younger portion of the female
population; but I feel assured that a more thorough knowledge of the principles of their own pure religion
will speedily restore these young people to habits of propriety, even more strict than those which were
imposed upon them by the authority of their Mahometan brethren." Bah! thus you might chant, if you chose; but
loving the truth, you will not so disown sweet Bethlehem; you will not disown or dissemble your right good
hearty delight when you find, as though in a desert, this gushing spring of fresh and joyous girlhood.

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